Google is at it once again. This time, they're not taking home a company, but a patent...a very important patent. Google is now the proud new owner of a patent titled "Determining and/or using location information in an ad system". VentureBeat noticed the patent and 6 others that were awarded as well. Google applied for the patent in 2004, way before any of the buzz (pun intended) around location was born.
The patent covers:
The usefulness, and consequently the performance, of advertisements are improved by allowing businesses to better target their ads to a responsive audience. Location information is determined (or simply accepted) and used. For example, location information may be used in a relevancy determination of an ad. As another example, location information may be used in an attribute (e.g., position) arbitration. Such location information may be associated with price information, such as a maximum price bid. Such location information may be associated with ad performance information. Ad performance information may be tracked on the basis of location information. The content of an ad creative, and/or of a landing page may be selected and/or modified using location information. Finally, tools, such as user interfaces, may be provided to allow a business to enter and/or modify location information, such as location information used for targeting and location-dependent price information. The location information used to target and/or score ads may be, include, or define an area. The area may be defined by at least one geographic reference point (e.g., defined by latitude and longitude coordinates) and perhaps additional information. Thus, the area may be a circle defined by a geographic reference point and a radius, an ellipse defined by two geographic reference points and a distance sum, or a polygon defined by three or more geographic reference points, for example.
This makes Google's purchase of AdMob seem even more appropriate. Seems that might have been 750 million well spent. Google already has much of the advertising market cornered, and it looks like they'll be hitting location-aware ads big time very soon. Guess what else, though? This affects Google's buddy Apple in a big way, too. Apple just picked up Quattro Wireless, an AdMob competitor. They might be serving up ads on mobile devices, which is fine, but if they'll want to make those ads relevant to location, they'll be coughing up a hefty licensing fee to Google before they can do so.
While the location wars ravage on, Google is biding its time and taking calculated moves that seem obvious after execution. Rather than focusing on the social side (Foursquare, Gowalla, Loopt, Whirrl), Google is (naturally) focusing on the search side. How often do you search for a local business on Google? Pretty often, right? Well, that's what Google is counting on with Google places, which used to be Local Business Center. 
foursquare, 
;)
The Circuit is an FTW LLC Production. Original digital content and products that just can't lose.